Information Technology

About Host Accounts for Departments and Student
Organizations

This guide describes Enterprise Technology Services (ETS)
services departments and organizations can use in sending and
receiving electronic mail and providing information on campus or via
the Internet. These services provide easy-to-remember e-mail
addresses, an online e-mail directory, and a convenient way for
people to contact UVM departments and student organizations. For
example, someone completing an undergraduate program at another
institution could e-mail a request for information on graduate
programs to "graduate.admissions@uvm.edu" after finding the Graduate
Admissions Office in the UVM online directory.

Who is eligible?

ETS will create a group e-mail address, and if necessary a host
account, for any academic or administrative department or any
officially recognized organization that designates a person who will
take responsibility for all use of the address. Organizations must be
sponsored by a UVM faculty or staff employee. However, in rare
instances, a student organization may be granted permission by the
Student Government Association to have someone other than a UVM
faculty or staff employee as the sponsor or responsible person.

The online directory

UVM's online directory, also known as the LDAP, white pages or "ph," is
how people find names, e-mail addresses, and telephone numbers for
UVM students, employees, departments, and organizations. The
directory is searchable by name, department, and nickname(s), and
also contains e-mail addresses, telephone numbers, postal addresses,
and optional information such as business hours. An "alias" uniquely
identifies each directory entry. Here is a sample directory entry for
a department or organization:

Creating your directory entry

To request an entry for your department or organization, please
complete the
Department or Organization Account Application and return it to ETS Account Services, either via
electronic mail to account.services@uvm.edu, or via campus mail to
238 Waterman Building. ETS will create a basic online directory entry
with the alias and name you request. The person in your department or
organization responsible for your online directory entry will use
"ph" software -- and a secret password -- to add your e-mail address
and any other information you want to provide, such as telephone
number, address, and hours.

The e-mail address should be that of an individual in the
department or organization who is designated to receive your e-mail.
To accommodate vacations and changes in responsibility for handling
e-mail, you can change the target e-mail address as often as you need
to.

Sending e-mail using your online directory
address

Once someone has found your entry in the online directory, she or
he can send e-mail using either the alias or the address given in the
e-mail field. Following the example above, e-mail would be addressed
to:

graduate.admissions@uvm.edu or gradcoll@uvm.edu

Mail sent to either address can be forwarded to the appropriate staff member automatically.

Department and organization accounts for e-mail and
electronic publishing

ETS strongly encourages use of an individual's e-mail account to receive messages addressed to the department
or organization, as shown in the examples above. Under special circumstances, however, departments may have
special information needs beyond those which can be satisfied by an individual account. An example of such a need
is disk space on www.uvm.edu or another ETS server to electronically publish web pages and other departmental
documents. Under these circumstances, ETS will create a separate account.

To request a host account for your department or organization,
please complete the Department
or Organization zoo.uvm.edu Account Application that appears in ETS's
Web Pages and return it to ETS Account Services, either via
electronic mail to account.services@uvm.edu, or via campus mail to
238Waterman Building. You must designate a person who will take
responsibility for all use of the account. Student organizations must
be sponsored by a UVM faculty or staff employee. However, in rare
instances, a student organization may be granted permission by the
Student Government Association to have someone other than a UVM
faculty or staff employee as the sponsor or responsible person.

Using a department or organization account for
e-mail

Normally a department or organization account would be used only
to receive e-mail. You direct e-mail to the account by specifying its
e-mail address in the "e-mail" field in your department's or
organization's entry in the online directory. For example:

In this example, e-mail addressed to graduate.admissions@uvm.edu
is sent to the account gradcoll on zoo.uvm.edu.

ETS recommends that you set up the account to forward all incoming
mail to one or several designated people in the department or
organization. To set mail forwarding, go to UVM's zoo.uvm.edu
Account Web Pages and click on 'Work with your mail handling!'.
Having the account automatically forward incoming messages means that
no one has to log on to the account to read mail; instead, each
designated person receives each message, and the appropriate person
handles or responds to it. Alternatively, you can designate one or
more (but preferably not more than three) people to log on to the
account and read messages. After reading each message, that person
can forward it to the appropriate person for action. In either case,
recipients of messages from your department or organization may
appreciate receiving messages from individuals rather than from the
common, but anonymous, account. Some words of caution:

If you use a common department or organization e-mail account,
please follow these guidelines:

*Only the primary contact person or sponsoring UVM employee can
request account services to reset a forgotten password or to change
the disk quota.

*The primary contact person (for departments) or the sponsoring
faculty/staff person (for organizations) is responsible for all use
of the account and would be subject to any disciplinary action taken
for violations of policies covering the account.

*Passwords may be given only to the individuals named on the
account application. Notify the Account Services office of any
changes in authorized individuals. Be sure to change the password
when an authorized person leaves the department or organization, and
whenever you suspect the password may be known by anyone other than
those authorized to use the account.

Finding help

For further help contact the ETS Help Line at 656-2604 or send
e-mail to helpline@uvm.edu. Assistance is also available from ETS
Account Services at 656-2006 or e-mail to
account.services@uvm.edu.